


i will know who you are yet

by patrokla



Category: Fallout (Video Games), Fallout 4
Genre: Angst, Gen, Gender Issues, Genderfluid Character, Id Fic, basically just gender issues: a fallout story tbh
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-18
Updated: 2018-07-18
Packaged: 2019-06-12 09:58:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,552
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15337419
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/patrokla/pseuds/patrokla
Summary: "You know you can talk to me about things, right? Even things that might be difficult to talk about?”“Aw, boss, you know I’d never do that,” Deacon says, “I want you to like me, don’t I?”





	i will know who you are yet

**Author's Note:**

> After two solid months of writing, editing, re-editing, deleting, and re-writing this fic, I've chosen to put it up rather than let it languish in the dusty vaults of the notes app. It probably should be a lot longer or shorter than it is.
> 
> Some general notes:  
> \- This fic contains very mild spoilers for the Railroad storyline in Fallout 4.  
> \- Deacon's canonical backstory has largely been thrown by the wayside here.  
> \- This is not a pro-Nate story.
> 
> The title comes from the Mountain Goats' song 'Going to Queens.' The two italicized bits in the beginning come from Deacon's in-game dialogue, and a terminal entry in Railroad HQ, respectively.

_"One time, I got a face change and was a girl for a few months. You should've seen the looks back at HQ."_  
  
_At one point in 2275, Deacon was kicked out of HQ by former leader Pinky Thompson because he was “sick of the lying, face-changing son of a bitch,” and because Deacon had spent a month as a ghoul, which “freaked a lot of people out."_  


\---  
  
The Railroad demands total secrecy and subterfuge from all of its agents. Nora’s not too proud to admit she has trouble with this, at first. As the General of the Minutemen, she spends her time in a uniform that’s growing increasingly recognizable across the Commonwealth, and she loudly confirms her identity and affiliation wherever she goes. It’s a loud, charismatic part she’s played for months - it has to be in order to convince struggling people to agree to risk their lives to help neighbors they barely know.  
  
Slipping into the role of Fixer, an anonymous heavy whose friends wouldn’t give her a second glance if they passed her in Diamond City, is a drastic change. In some ways, it’s a relief. Wherever she goes as the General, she can feel the desperate hope of every farmer hoping to provide a better world for their children. Fixer is just a part of a larger machine, one whose pieces have been broken beyond repair before, and will be broken again. It’s an exponentially more dangerous job, being a Railroad agent, but there’s less weight on her shoulders.  
  
Deacon is probably a part of that. They’ve been traveling together since she first walked into the Railroad, at first out of necessity, but now because they just work well together. He was the one who taught her how to alter her appearance from settlement to settlement, just enough that no one would mistake the two of them for anything but scavvers, or farmers, or whatever their costume of the week is. In return, she showed him how to pick the locks of the most complicated safes, and shared her Covert Ops magazines.  
  
She doesn’t know why they get along, when he’s a professional liar and she’s a professional do-gooder, but they do. During the months that follow her induction into the Railroad, life is strange, dangerous, and surprisingly good.  
  
—  
  
They’re settled down for the night in the ruins of Quincy when Deacon first mentions _it_. It’s a casual comment, one that could easily be a lie meant to wind her up, or amuse her. But there’s something off about his tone when he says it, a slight bitterness that has the ring of truth.  
  
“You know, one time I got a face change and was a girl for a few months. You should've seen the looks back at HQ,” he says, and she raises her eyebrows and wonders to herself what exactly this means.  
  
She’s too tired to interrogate him about it; the usual game of 20 Questions seems exhausting when she knows that tomorrow they’ll have to travel to Monsignor Plaza to clear it for Randolph Safehouse. Like all the help they’ve given Randolph, this has the potential to result in the Railroad’s destruction. She’s still not sure if they’re really helping move synths out of the Commonwealth, or just serving to confirm all of the Institute’s suspicions. Deacon hasn’t voiced his own thoughts on the matter, but he has long briefings with Desdemona and Glory every time they check in at HQ after working for Randolph. She knows that Desdemona weighs the risks every time, has to decide if the potential to help is worth losing two agents - and maybe much, much more.  
  
Unlike Deacon, Nora’s not privy to those considerations. It’s not something she really begrudges him, but hey - if he’s going to keep his mouth shut about things, she can learn to as well. So, instead of asking any questions, she just says, “You were that ugly, huh,” and he rolls his eyes and says, “When have you ever known me to be less than stunning?” and the rest of the night passes in an easy exchange of insults and crispy squirrel bits.  
  
—  
  
The next time isn’t really a time - it’s not until later that she slots it into a chronology, a narrative that only fits together with hindsight.  
  
They’re in the grimy hallways of Hub 360, having spent the last hour looking for a damn cache that, when finally found, seems barely worth the time and ammo spent finding it. Nora rifles through the musty clothes in distaste, grimacing at the faded cotton dresses and badly-patched jackets. Deacon is allegedly keeping guard, but he’s really just watching her, although she’s not sure if it’s out of genuine interest or a habit he’s used to keeping.  
  
“Guess dresses are just another thing that was better in the old world, huh?”  
  
Nora shrugs, re-folding the clothes for the next person desperate enough to actually use them.  
  
“I’ve never really liked them, but they were mandatory in court for women until 2076. They might as well have been mandatory in public, too.”  
  
“I’m sensing some bitterness there, boss,” Deacon says lightly.  
  
“Maybe a little,” she says, “You know, I wore pants to the grocery store once, and someone ‘accidentally’ threw an apple at me.”  
  
Deacon raises his eyebrows, then asks, “An apple?”  
  
“Like a mutfruit,” she says, crouching to grab a few fusion cells from the floor of the cache. “But harder, and not purple. Not really the kind of thing you want thrown at you, especially when you’re carrying a baby…”  
  
She gets lost for a moment, recalling the warm, squirmy weight of Shaun on some ordinary morning, 200 years ago. When she comes back, Deacon is shaking his head in disbelief.  
  
“Did anyone stick up for you?”  
  
“Nate just said I should’ve just sent Codsworth to buy everything,” she says, huffing a little at the memory. “He thought I was making trouble for myself, and he wasn’t wrong, exactly. But it was more than that.”  
  
“Sounds like it,” Deacon says, sounding as strange and far away as she feels. “What a world.”  
  
She hums in agreement. “Not everything we lost was good,” she says.  
  
“Maybe not, but I think most of the bad things stuck around,” Deacon says.  
  
Thinking of Nate and the thin smile he’d give her when they went out in public together, she can only shrug.  
  
—  
  
The third time is when she starts to connect the dots, or rather, she starts to realize there are dots to connect in the first place.  
  
It’s very early in the morning, and they’re slinking towards a Randolph dead-drop in the shadow of the broken freeway.  
  
“I should probably get a face change soon,” Deacon murmurs, absently running a hand along his rifle. “It’s been almost six months.”  
  
“Why so long?” Nora asks, barely focusing on him as she scans the dead grass for movement.  
  
“Figured I’d give you a chance to get used to this one first,” Deacon says lightly. “It freaks people out, sometimes, seeing the new one.”  
  
“Oh,” Nora says, glancing at him. His face is unreadable under his sunglasses and Gunner green bandana. “Well, I don’t think I’ll be too alarmed. I’ve seen a lot of faces change, you know.”  
  
“You say that,” Deacon says wryly, “but you’d be surprised. I mean, I could show up looking like anyone. Imagine if I came back looking like Drummer Boy? Or Piper?”  
  
“I guess it could be a little weird at first,” Nora allows, feeling like she’s on uncertain ground, “but as long as I knew it was you, it would be alright. Doc Crocker can do a lot with a scalpel, but I don’t think he’s found a way to fix your personality yet.”  
  
“He’s tried, but he couldn’t find a thing to improve on,” Deacon says, smirking, and then they sight a raider lurking suspiciously near the dead drop and there’s no time to do anything but aim, fire, and look for cover.  
  
—  
  
Deacon’s hinting at something, that much is clear. Nora tries - well, she doesn’t really try to figure out what’s going on. She tries just enough to feel like she’s tried, but nowhere near enough to actually do anything.  
  
They’re waiting out a rad storm in the laundry mat in Lexington. It had been early afternoon when the sky began to glow a hazy green, but Nora’s guessing that it’ll be fully dark by the time the storm finally dies down.  
  
“This might sound like a dumb question,” Deacon says, breaking a long lull in the conversation, “but rad storms weren’t around before you got frozen, were they?”  
  
“I prefer the term ‘forcibly cryogenically preserved,’” Nora responds, mouth still dry from the Rad-X she and Deacon had taken as soon as they’d gotten under a roof, “but yeah, these are new. We still had regular storms, but the glowing, deadly radiation thing is new. In general.”  
  
“I figured, but I met this ghoul once who said rad storms were caused by uh, planes messing up clouds, or something? Which sounds pretty ridiculous now that I say it out loud…”  
  
“I mean, we had - I don’t remember what it was, but there was a whole cloud thing that involved planes. But it didn’t turn anything green. I think it was to make it rain more often?”  
  
“Wish we had those now,” Deacon sighs, and Nora thinks of the cracked, dried earth of Abernathy Farms.  
  
“Could come in handy,” Nora agrees, and then, impulsively, she says, “This might sound like a dumb question, but you know you can talk to me about - things, right? Even things that might be difficult to talk about?”  
  
She feels more than sees Deacon freeze up in her peripheral vision, and knows instantly that this approach to finding out whatever Deacon’s been uneasy about is all wrong.  
  
“Aw, boss, you know I’d never do that,” Deacon says, shoulders untensing in a parody of relaxation, “I want you to like me, don’t I?”  
  
“I’ve never really gotten that impression,” Nora quips, trying to return to familiar ground. They settle into a less than comfortable silence.  
  
—  
  
“So, you and Deacon,” Drummer Boy says one day - or possibly night, it’s hard to tell in the windowless headquarters of the Railroad. Nora is there to pick up a new MILA from Tinker Tom, and Deacon is there to report to Desdemona on something Nora doesn’t have clearance for.  
  
“Me and Deacon?”  
  
“You actually get along with him?” Drummer Boy asks, and Nora can’t help but laugh at the question.  
  
“Yes,” she says. “I was surprised, too.”  
  
“You don’t have to travel with him, if you don’t want to,” he says, bluntly honest. “He usually works alone, he’ll be fine.”  
  
“I’ll let you know if that happens,” Nora says flatly, feeling offended on Deacon’s behalf, and Drummer Boy sighs.  
  
“Don’t take that the wrong way,” he says, “I like Deacon, but you need more than ‘like’ in our line of work. You need substance to really know someone, to really _trust_ them, and he’s all surface. Take it from someone who’s known Deacon for a long time - no matter what you go through together, he won’t ever tell you more.”  
  
“I - “ Nora starts, and she’s relieved when Deacon pops up next to her, because she doesn’t whether she was going to say ‘I trust him’ or ‘I think he’s hiding something’.  
  
“C’mon, boss, we’ve got business to attend to,” Deacon says, and he salutes Drummer Boy with two fingers before sauntering off towards the exit. Nora nods in farewell, and just gets an unreadable look in return.  
  
—  
  
She thinks that things will continue on in their slightly strange, confusing vein for a while longer before Deacon is willing to show his cards - or even tell her the game that they’re playing. She’s alright with that - after her last attempt, she doesn’t know how to try and broach the subject of Deacon’s strangeness. Her life with Nate hadn’t exactly prepared her for earnest, honest communication.  
  
Instead, it’s only two days later when Deacon asks, voice light as anything, “When’s the next time we’ll be in Diamond City?”  
  
“Tomorrow, if you need,” Nora says, maybe more quickly than she means to. Despite her best efforts, she keeps hearing Drummer Boy’s words in her head. _He’s all surface - he won’t ever tell you more._  
  
“Great,” Deacon says. “I think it’s time I pay Doc Crocker a visit.”  
  
“Great,” Nora echoes.  
  
—  
  
Tomorrow turns out to be a pipe dream of a timeline - as so often happens when Nora’s on the coast, things turn to utter shit. They would’ve had to make exceptionally good time to make it back to Diamond City from Nordhagen Beach in a day, it’s true. But Nora can’t help but feel that they might’ve made better time if Deacon hadn’t insisted that they spend half the day ducking Brotherhood of Steel vertibird patrols around the Prydwen.  
  
She’s not exactly quiet about this opinion, despite Deacon’s repeated complaints that her voice will alert someone.  
  
“Deacon, there’s no way they’d be interested in us,” she says around noon, as they crouch outside Easy City Downs. They’ve been there for at least half an hour, time standing still as it gets hotter and hotter. They’re close enough to hear the tinny music signaling the start of a race for what must be the tenth time.  
  
“They probably wouldn’t even spot us,” she tries a few hours later, as they make their way past the outskirts of Boston and into the city proper. They’re moving painstakingly slowly; only barely to Postal Square and it’s already starting to get dark out. There’s not a chance that the Brotherhood of Steel would see them, let alone shoot at them. Whatever’s driving Deacon’s paranoia, it’s definitely not logic.  
  
Deacon just shrugs and smiles a wide, fake smile, the kind of smile she’s meant to know is a lie.  
  
“We’ll get there, Fixer,” he says, and she wants to snap at him.  
  
_He won’t ever tell you more._  
  
“Alright,” she says, after a long moment. The sun sets as they creep down the streets in silence.  
  
—  
  
They reach Diamond City some time between night and morning, during that nameless, weightless hour that she’s experienced so many times with Deacon. Usually it makes her feel like they’re the last two people on the planet; like the bombs fell all over again and they’re the only ones left.  
  
Right now it just feels suffocating, like forced intimacy. Like sitting in a car with a man who will never, ever be on your side.  
  
Like she’s done every morning since she woke up in the future, totally alone, Nora puts it all aside. She walks through the gates of Diamond City and watches Deacon walk towards the Surgery Center, then slips into Piper’s home and falls asleep on the couch by the door.  
  
She dreams about vertibirds crashing into Sanctuary, and strangers running out of the houses to stare in horror at the smoke and flames.  
  
—  
  
“Hey, lady!”  
  
Nora wakes up abruptly to the sight of Nat standing over her, looking judgmental as only a pre-teen can look.  
  
“You look tired,” Nat informs her, and then, “Someone left this for you.”  
  
A piece of paper floats onto her face and she grabs it with clumsy fingers.  
  
“Time ’s’it?”  
  
“Late,” Nat says, sounding delighted. “I already went to school, and came back, and sold three papers. Guess you were pretty tired.”  
  
“I was,” Nora says, sitting up with a groan. She doesn’t want to see what’s written on the paper. “Where’s Piper?”  
  
“At Mr. Valentine’s,” Nat says, “she said to meet her for noodles, if you ever woke up.”  
  
“Great, thanks, Nat,” Nora says. She feels strangely hungover, wrung out and slow.  
  
The paper, when she finally brings herself to read it, is almost blank. A few words, scrawled in an unfamiliar hand, mar the center.  
  
_Fixer -_  
_Gone on vacation._  
  
She sighs, smiles a little to think of someone using the word vacation in this century, then tears the paper into tiny, tiny pieces, and scatters it across Piper’s floor.  
  
Time to get some noodles.  
  
—  
  
“So,” Piper says, the second that Nora sits down on a stool at Power Noodles, “Your friend didn’t spend the night, huh?”  
  
“I didn’t realize you were up when I came in,” Nora mutters. She doesn’t bother to ask how Piper knows that she arrived in the city with someone - Diamond City Security are some of the chattiest guys she’s ever met.  
  
“My sleep rhythms are just as fucked as yours, my friend,” Piper says wryly, reaching over the bar to grab a bottle of Nuka-Cola. “You think that running a paper by yourself is restful?”  
  
“I never said that,” Nora says. She likes Piper, trusts her as much as she trusts all of her companions, but - “Look, I’m not really in the mood to talk.”  
  
“Fair enough,” Piper says, "Well, my door is open and my terminal is on if you feel like talking. On or off the record.  
  
“Thanks,” Nora says, and Piper slips off the stool and saunters towards Nat, who is waving a paper and haranguing a woman heading up into the stands.  
  
For a second, she feels absurdly and overwhelmingly alone. No Deacon, no Piper, not even Dogmeat to keep her company. Then the noise of the city rushes in, and she shivers, trying to shake off the last few days. She can be alone. She can be anything, and anyone.  
  
Takahashi snaps his pincers right in front of her, and she startles. She should probably start things off by being a paying customer.  
  
—  
  
What’s left of the afternoon passes quickly; she’s been low on essentials for weeks, and it’s easy to get lost in haggling with Arturo over the price of electromagnetic cartridges. 19 caps per is highway robbery, honestly, but it’s nice to know she’ll be able to take out the next Mirelurk or Yao Guai she runs across with ease. After that comes more serious negotiations with Myrna. Myrna calls her a good-for-nothing scavver as she leaves, several hundred caps richer and several dozen pounds of junk lighter, which is always a good sign.  
  
She knows that when Deacon shows up - when, not if - he’s going to make a big thing over the face change. She’s not sure what kind of thing, exactly, but she suspects that if she doesn’t recognize the new him quickly, he’ll rub it in. Or maybe not - maybe he’ll show up with his new face and they’ll tease each other and get back to work. Maybe things will be that simple.  
  
—  
  
She thinks about asking Piper if she wants to travel a bit, but something makes her avoid the reporter's house as she leaves Diamond City. Maybe it would be a good thing to be alone for a little while longer. Deacon will show up at some point, and in the mean time, there are always settlements that need help wiping out a nest of ferals.  
  
It’s easy to fall into a routine of traveling during the day again and spending the night at friendly settlements, or in ruins behind turrets she’s hacked into friendliness. She uses all of her cartridges wiping out a deathclaw that gets the jump on her, wheedles some more out of Lucas Miller’s private ammo stash, and almost loses her hat to a stealthy Assaultron.  
  
It’s just business as usual, violent, exhausting, and satisfying in a way she doesn’t like to examine. She’s waiting for Deacon, but she’s not waiting around for him.  
  
—  
  
A month later, Nora’s at Greentop Nursery. It’s her third visit in the last week; their turrets have been taken out twice by Gunners, but no one has managed to breach the fence she’d spent several days putting up. This time, loaded up with oil and gears, she’s replacing the broken machine gun turrets with laser turrets, and moving them to even higher ground.  
  
She’s taking a lunch break when she glimpses someone working in the greenhouse whom she doesn’t recognize. The old, pre-Railroad Nora would’ve made a point of knowing every settler allied with the Minutemen, but months of undercover work have made her a little more hesitant to reach out. Post-Railroad her is still a little embarrassed. She’s been there for the better part of the week and has put up an entire fence, but she can’t be bothered to introduce herself to the people she’s trying to protect?  
  
She jumps down from newly reinforced scaffolding and walks over to the greenhouse, wiping greasy palms against her pants.  
  
“Hi there,” she begins, and then stops abruptly as the settler - person - woman - _Deacon_ turns around.  
  
“Hey, boss,” Deacon says - and that _is_ Deacon, she’s sure of it.  
  
She doesn’t respond right away, just taking in the changes - short, light hair that’s almost long enough to start curling, a slightly higher voice, and a face that’s the same and different in such strange ways. Deacon’s skin looks much less weathered, and she wonders idly if face surgeons take every part of someone’s face and replace it, if Deacon is much older or much younger than she ever suspected.  
  
And yet, so many things are the same. The sunglasses are there, of course, and the smirk, and the familiar, solid presence that stood by her side for so long. She knows that it’s Deacon, through and through.  
  
“Hey,”  she finally says softly, and they should get out of the greenhouse, really, before anyone notices this inexplicable exchange between two people who should be strangers.  
  
“Want some help with those turrets?” Deacon asks, and Nora smiles, nods.  
  
They get to work.  
  
—  
  
It’s not until much later that day that they actually talk about anything. The new turrets are up, the fence is reinforced, and Nora feels accomplished as she rolls out her sleeping bag in the half-shack attached to the main house. She’s not surprised to see another sleeping bag already there; the settlers had told her that “Amy” had shown up a few days earlier looking to work there until the next trader showed up and she could get a safe trip back to Diamond City.  
  
It’s very late, and the world is very quiet around them, when Nora says tentatively, "So, the face change..."  
  
For a moment she thinks that Deacon will stay silent, and they'll just carry on the next morning like nothing's different. Then-  
  
“I never really plan on changing myself like this,” Deacon says, staring determinedly at the barrel fire in the corner. “I really don’t, and I can’t explain it. I know it’s weird. I know it makes me seem even worse than I already do. But I get restless sometimes, like I’m stuck in a tiny room and I’ll never get out, and this settles me like nothing else does - and I’ve tried so many things.”  
  
“You don’t have to say anything,” Deacon says when she stays silent at this revelation that explains everything and nothing, “people usually don’t. But they look at me like you’re looking at me. It’s fine. I’ve traveled on my own for a long time, and so have you. We don’t need -“  
  
“Don’t,” Nora interrupts, “Deacon, just give me a minute.”  
  
She watches the flames reflect off of Deacon’s sunglasses for a moment and steels herself for honesty.  
  
“That time that you asked me about not wearing dresses,” she starts hesitantly, “I said I didn’t like them, but I didn’t really explain it all the way. You've seen how things can be different for a man and a woman in the Commonwealth. I guess you've probably lived it. But all people really want to do now is survive, in whatever way they can. Back then, when we assumed survival was a given, there was room for all of these…expectations that came with being a man or a woman. You were supposed to wear the right thing, love the right kind of person, and live the right lifestyle. I tried to do that for decades, for my whole life, really. And it never fit, none of it. I know that I never liked wearing dresses. I - I've never told anyone this, but I don’t know if I loved Nate. I know that I should miss him more than I do. It’s ironic, really, that I’m supposed to avenge this life I never really wanted.”  
  
Deacon’s mouth tilts up a little, and Nora continues, feeling like she’s found the right track.  
  
“I know it’s not exactly the same thing, but there were times that I felt like I couldn’t ever be who I wanted to be and be a woman at the same time. I had to choose between respectability and being comfortable in my own skin, and then between being a mother and having a career. What I’m trying to say is that I get the conflicts between what you need and what people expect. It doesn’t scare me, Deacon.”  
  
“I know I’m the liar here, but it’s gonna take me some time to believe that,” Deacon admits. “The last time I did this and told anyone that it was me was years ago. Pinky, he was the boss at the time, he kicked me out of HQ because of it. Well, there were some other things, too, but that was the proverbial straw, y’know? I haven’t told anyone about it since then. I heard what Drummer Boy said to you, and I know that it’s what they’re all thinking - I don’t show people what’s below the surface, and if that surface is changing all the time, of course they won’t feel like they know me. Sometimes I don’t even know if I know me, or if there is a me beyond what everyone sees me do.”  
  
Nora sighs, wondering if Drummer Boy knew then that Deacon had been listening. Had his words been a casual warning to a fellow agent, or a deliberate jab at someone who never fit in?  
  
“There is,” she finally says. “I know there is, because I knew it was you before you even turned around. Even with the changes, I knew you right away. Drummer Boy was right about one thing: I don’t have to travel with you. But -“  
  
She has to take a breath. The words that are caught in her throat are ones she hasn’t said to anyone in over two centuries.  
  
“I missed you, and I’d like to think you missed me, too. We don’t _need_ each other to survive, but there should be more to life than bare need. Even in the wasteland.”  
  
Deacon might be looking at her, but she can’t tell, won’t tell, is looking down at the dusty wooden floor feeling almost as weak as the morning she’d woken up and found the note.  
  
“Well,” Deacon says, after an eternity, “I guess I kinda missed you, too. Feels a lot dumber rushing recklessly into a firefight when you don’t have backup.”  
  
“Yeah,” Nora replies, thinking of the deathclaw, “that sounds pretty dumb.”  
  
As they fall into a comfortable, tired silence, Nora looks up at the stars through the slatted roof. Her life now might be strange and dangerous, but with Deacon at her side, there's a chance that it'll also be very, very good.


End file.
